


The Skin Exchange

by ckret2



Series: Alastor Week [5]
Category: Hazbin Hotel (Web Series)
Genre: Canon-Typical Behavior, Canon-Typical Violence, Deer Alastor (Hazbin Hotel), Gen, Leather, Mild Gore, Worldbuilding, all the gore is offscreen but there's a lot of talk of people getting skinned, but like not in a kinky way there's just a lot of leather, it's ok; if they survive the process they get a store discount
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-08
Updated: 2020-08-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:13:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25778734
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ckret2/pseuds/ckret2
Summary: It's been a month since the annual extermination, and everyone knows what that means: big sale on leather and animal hides!Alastor is disappointed they don't have any new deerskin this year.Of course, if hereallywants fresh deerskin, there's an obvious solution to the problem.
Series: Alastor Week [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1863841
Comments: 12
Kudos: 110





	The Skin Exchange

**Author's Note:**

> [Alastor Week](https://twitter.com/SchwiftyChicka/status/1275649386781999107) Day 5: "Different Clothes/ **Deer form** "!
> 
> "What's your favorite part of Alastor that you haven't had a chance to explore yet?" The fact that his murderousness + his deerness + his willingness to view the bodies of the (partially animal) people around him as things he can consume + his vaguely alluded to connections to hunting = I finally have a character that gives me an excuse to write about my huge boner for leatherworking. My friends, I just had several years where my primary fandom was _Transformers_. Do you know how hard it is to squeeze leatherwork into a Transformers fanfic?

Even as accustomed as Hell was to Heaven's annual raids, it still took several days for the last of the corpses of the newly exterminated to be collected off the streets, whether by professional scavengers, by irritated neighbors who needed to use the driveway, or by opportunistic cannibals.

After that, those that made goods from the corpses would spend a couple of weeks acquiring them: first the large batches bought from the fastest scavengers, then smaller batches as scavengers found stray bodies in unnoticed alleys or tossed in dumpsters, and then one by one bought off stragglers who'd finished picking the meat from the bones and didn't have any use for the rest of a body. Whenever a body was brought in, whether it was within a few days of the extermination or up to three weeks later, it took about a week to process the remains into a marketable form.

And so it was that every year, exactly one month after the extermination, the Skin Exchange had its annual one-week surplus sale.

And every year, exactly one month and one day after the extermination, the Radio Demon walked in the door with his smile stretched as wide as it could go and the corners of his eyes crinkled in unbridled glee.

The store owner, a massive Minotaur with a bandage covering the right half of his rib cage, looked up from his work bench as the bell over the door rang. He grunted. "Alastor. Thought you'd be by soon." Greeting delivered, he turned back to his work: carving a drawing of a truck stop in the woods into a slab of leather.

"Good morning, Skinner! Always a delight to visit your tannery!"

Skinner grunted again.

Alastor held the door open long enough for Angel Dust to catch it, then hurried into the store, examining the tables set up nearest the door. Angel looked around, and his curious grin immediately vanished. "The fuck is this?"

"I told you, the Skin Exchange!" Alastor picked up a strip of cotton candy blue rabbit fur, eyed it skeptically, and dropped it to examine a stingray skin at the next table. "The most respectable tannery in Pentagram City. You won't find better quality for hundreds of miles!"

Skinner grunted again at the praise.

Angel crossed a set of arms. "Okay, see, when you walk into the hotel sayin' you need to buy some stuff for Rosie's clothing store at the 'Skin Exchange,' does anybody wanna come along—I'm expecting to find clothing," he said. "And with a name like _Skin Exchange_ , probably _revealing_ clothing. Figured, I dunno, I could get some new dance clothes."

"Ah," Alastor said. "And here I thought you shared my enthusiasm for fine leather goods." He almost sounded genuinely disappointed.

Angel shrugged. "Eh. I mean, I'm not gonna say no to a nice leather jacket..."

"Garment leather," Skinner called. "Middle tables. Behind the cash registers."

Angel gave him a skeptical look, but headed toward the middle.

Alastor, meanwhile, had already grabbed a couple dozen thin, soft pieces of leather about the size of serving trays and started a pile in front of one of the cash registers. "Interesting array of colors this year," Alastor said, nodding at the table; he'd plucked out all the more natural colors, the earthy browns and mossy greens and bloody reds and so forth, and left behind a pile of mostly neon pinks and blues. "I thought you would be the last store to go for that gaudy chrome tanned stuff. Is that what _the market_ is demanding?" Alastor's tone betrayed exactly what he thought of "the market" and its modern sensibilities.

"Those cuts are all natural," Skinner said. He'd finished carving out the drawing on his leather and was now hammering down on it with metal tools with textured tips, engraving more realistic textures into the pine trees and wooden truck stop walls. "No dye. They came in like that."

Alastor's invisible studio audience oohed and ahhed in amazement. "Really!" He leaned over to examine a piece in fluorescent yellow. "Sinners are coming in the strangest colors these days."

Skinner grunted in agreement.

Angel, who'd been contemplatively eyeing a roll of hot magenta garment leather and trying to imagine it in the shape of a midriff-baring biker jacket, looked up. "Wait, 'sinners'? This shit is made outta people?"

Skinner grunted in confirmation.

"You're not going to find ranches of cattle awaiting the slaughter in Hell," Alastor said.

"Well— _yeah_ , but—we got our own wild animals, you ain't using that?"

"Some. Back right tables, exotic skins," Skinner said. "But sinners make better quality. Easier to pin 'em and skin 'em."

Alastor's studio audience laughed. "Well said!"

Angel considered this, studied the magenta hide again, and shrugged.

Alastor claimed a shopping basket and circled the wall, unfolding a shopping list from Rosie as he did. Scooping several colors and thicknesses of suede lacing into the basket, he called to Skinner, "What does the selection look like this year?"

"Lotta wolflikes and hellhounds," Skinner said. "Got a discount on those."

"Wonderful! Rosie asked for warm furs this year. She thinks we'll be in for some cold weather."

Skinner scoffed.

"You may laugh, but I wouldn't doubt her! What does the color variety look like?"

"Same as every year on the hellhounds. Got some of the funky colors on the wolflikes."

"Hmm. What else?"

"Rosie always gets lotsa belt blanks, don't she?" Skinner asked.

Alastor tried to move past the suede lacing, but was stopped by the display of horn and antler products. Absentmindedly, he said, "Always."

"Fewer blanks for functional belts this year," Skinner said. "But a lotta fashion belts." He paused his work to stretch, peel off the bloody bandage covering the right side of his torso, and apply a new one.

Angel, carrying the roll of magenta leather between his left arms as he examined a nearby rack, considered the addition of a belt to his future leather jacket. "What's the difference between a functional belt and a fashion belt?"

"Functional is durable. Treat it right and it'll last you a century. Usually made outta cowlike skin, elephantlike, buffalolike—thick stuff," Skinner said. He'd finished switching out his bandages and returned to his work. "Fashion is thin but pretty. Usually human skin."

Angel grimaced. "Seriously?"

"We have snakeskin, too."

"Do you _ever_!" Alastor had just discovered a massive roll of snakeskin propped up on its side and taking up half a table, the diameter of a monster truck tire. "Good golly, look at this thing!" He started unrolling it.

"That one's not part of the sale," Skinner said without looking. "Full price. Came off a monster, not a sinner. It ate two of my part-timers."

"I don't know what I'd do with it anyway." Alastor had unrolled it off the table and halfway across the floor and was still going.

Angel watched as Alastor made it to the other side of the room and started doubling back before returning his attention to the rack of soft suedes he'd been examining. He picked up a pale pink one, checked the shelf for the price, saw the label said "PIG-LIKE SUEDE," and tossed the suede back.

Alastor rolled the massive snakeskin back and forth across the room five and a half times before running out. With a snap of his fingers, it floated up and rolled back up into a wheel, like a tape measure retracting; and then he finally moved on to the belt blanks.

After collecting the belts, some thicker leather suitable for boots, and an array of buttons made from claw, teeth, and bone, Alastor headed to the leather dyes at the back of the store. He stopped to look up at the chandelier hung over Skinner's work table, one made of a dozen antlers tied together with light bulbs suspended between their prongs. "I don't suppose...?"

"Not for sale this year, either."

Alastor tisked in disappointment, a sound like a radio clicking off; then glanced around Skinner's massive shoulder to examine his work.

Skinner was using a paintbrush to carefully apply dye to the trucks in front of the truck stop; it soaked into the beige leather like watercolor paint into a paper towel.

"As fine an artisan as always."

"I'm not selling you my chandelier if you flatter me."

Alastor ignored the accusation. "You're always recreating that truck stop scene," he observed. "Practice makes perfect?"

"Something like that."

"Anything important about the view?"

"S'where I killed and skinned my sister."

"Ah! The start of a fine career!"

Skinner grunted in agreement.

Alastor dropped a few bottles of dye into his basket, checked Rosie's list to make sure it was complete, and tucked the list away in a pocket. "As long as I'm here," he said, "I don't suppose you've got any deerskin in stock?"

Angel—waiting for Alastor by the cash register with one set of arms crossed on the counter and the other playing with his phone—glanced up with a look of disgust. "Seriously? That's pretty sick."

"No deerskin," Skinner said.

Alastor's shoulders drooped. "None? At all?"

"Less deerlike sinners coming in these days. We've got a lotta horse."

"Well, that's not the same, _is_ it."

Skinner hunched one shoulder in a slow shrug. "Can't get you deer skin without a deer." He paused, set his brush aside, and turned to eye Alastor critically. "Do you need it bad?" His gaze roved up and down Alastor's form. "How many square feet?"

"No," Alastor said. "Absolutely not."

"Got painkillers."

"My friend, pain is the _least_ of my concerns! No, I'm not fond of the idea of... stripping down for you. It's rather intimate."

In disbelief, Angel called, " _That's_ the part that bothers you?!"

"Not all of us are seasoned professionals at getting naked in front of an audience."

"That ain't the point!"  


Skinner shrugged again. "Okay. You see a deerlike on the street and haul 'em in, I'll sell you the hide at the usual finder's discount. Otherwise, try again next year."

Alastor examined the holes wearing through at the seams of his gloves, lifted a shoe to examine the completely worn through backside and the mess of black stitches crossing back and forth to keep it from falling apart, tried to judge whether his gloves and shoes could last another year, and suppressed a sigh. "How deep do you have to cut? I have a _job_ now; I'd prefer not to have to take time off."

"Not that deep," Skinner said, peeling back a corner of his bandage to show Alastor the skinless meat underneath. Alastor looked at the damage, then gave a curious glance to the cut of leather Skinner had been carving his artwork into, trying to judge if it was the same size as the wound. Skinner slapped the bandage back in place and said, "Heals in a couple of weeks. Probably faster with your powers."

Alastor considered. "Can you dye it black?"

"Sure."

Alastor rubbed his chin thoughtfully.

Skinner threw in, "Thirty percent discount for donors on their next visit."

Alastor, still watching the bargaining, suddenly realized why this store was called the Skin _Exchange._

"Fine," Alastor said. "Where to?"

Skinner gestured toward a folding screen in the back. The floor near it had a couple of drains and some suspicious dark brown stains.

Angel watched as Alastor steeled himself and headed behind the folding screen. After a moment, Alastor's coat was flung over the top of the screen, followed next by his pants. Angel wolf whistled. "Yeeeah, take it off!"

Alastor played a very convincing impression of the sound of a glass bottle being smashed on a bartop to create a weapon. Angel laughed.

Once all the clothes were draped over the folding screen, to Angel's amazement, an actual deer—a _tall_ actual deer—poked its head around the side of the folding screen, nodded permissively, and retreated. Skinner stood up, grabbed a large skinning knife and—more alarmingly—strapped on a hockey mask, and disappeared behind the folding screen. Angel listened in horrified fascination to the fleshy sounds of slitting and peeling.

After several minutes, Skinner came back into view, grabbed some of his spare bandages, and disappears behind the folding screen again. A few minutes longer and he emerged to go to the restroom and wash his hands. Angel yelled, "Everything okay back there?"

It was a few seconds before Alastor answered. "Feeling a little more naked than I started."

"No kidding!"

Alastor's clothes started disappearing to the far side of the folding screen. "I've never been terribly sentimental about most of my birthday gifts," Alastor said, "but I admit—I've always been attached to my birthday suit." Cue the studio audience laughter.

If Alastor was making stupid jokes, he was fine. Angel looked back at his phone.

When Alastor emerged, he was carrying his coat and moving a little more gingerly, but otherwise appeared none the worse for the wear. He picked up his basket of merchandise, waited for Skinner to emerge from the restroom, and gestured toward the cash registers. "Ready when you are!"

Skinner put his mask and knife back where they belonged and headed toward the front.

"You'll probably want to get that skin appraised by a witch before you sell it," Alastor said, pausing to study some thick saddle leather. "My strongest magic is pain based. The hide should be magically potent, it can be marketed for spell work."

"Huh. Okay," Skinner said. He started ringing up Alastor's supplies. "You'll get the chunk you want at normal deerskin prices."

"Very generous of you!"

"Professional courtesy."

Angel gave Alastor a puzzled look. "'Professional courtesy'? Thought you were a radio host."

"Sure, that was my day job." He didn't elaborate further.

When Alastor had put the purchases on Rosie's account and Angel had paid for his supplies, they headed for the door. Looking at his receipt, Angel muttered, "Boy, this shit ain't cheap, huh? And I'm probably gonna have to come back for zippers and stuff."

"Thirty percent discount," Skinner reminded him. "Patterned fur is very popular."

Angel put a hand protectively over his chest fluff. "Hey, this is my moneymaker. No deal."

"I'll tell Rosie you said hello," Alastor said. "Or grunted some equivalent to 'hello,' anyway."

Skinner grunted. "Skin should be ready in a week. Couple days sooner if you want to donate some brains to tan it?" He leaned under the counter.

"Ha! I'm afraid I'm using all the ones I've got."

Skinner nodded and replaced the sledgehammer he'd picked up.

Angel gave Alastor an alarmed look. "This shit's got brains rubbed in it? Is that what the weird smell is?"

"No, no," Alastor reassured him, "the smell is probably the urine."

Angel held his roll of leather out at arm's length.

Alastor waved to Skinner. "I'll see you in a week!" The door swung shut behind him.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm too sleepy to infodump about leatherwork in the notes here but like, if you wanna know anything about leatherwork, feel free to ask in the comments.
> 
> You don't need to ask about the brains or urine though. I can confirm that that part's true.
> 
> Post for this fic available on [tumblr](https://ckret2.tumblr.com/post/625854917923504128/the-skin-exchange) and [twitter](https://twitter.com/ckret2/status/1291957737908326400?s=20). If you enjoyed the fic, comments/reblogs there are highly appreciated (as are comments here)!


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